-16 degrees (I assume you mean below zero, and not with wind-chill either, and converts I think to –27 Celsius) gets anyone’s attention!

I grew up and worked sometimes in similar temperatures, and I shiver at the thought even today, many years later. I suspect the reason South Dakota’s population has not increased significantly in the last 50 years has less to do with what the population may enjoy on cold winter nights, and more with the culling of the more weak via their emigration…just as this weak scribe emigrated to warmer climes… but maintains serious respect for those – their values, virtue, and spirit – who remain.

However, the British – like Noel Coward’s Mad Dogs and Englishmen – seem to gravitate toward “tropical climes,” which may explain the conspicuous absence of any Brits in the God’s country of SoDak.

Alright, it’s also -16 degrees. Can’t have everyting.

– Max

The fact is, rather than taxation being the primary cause of Britain’s “brain drain,” it is the expressed greater opportunity and quality of life elsewhere that draws Brits away from their homeland in great numbers.

A recent Emigrate magazine survey found 85% of readers thought, “Britain was grinding to a halt.”

The greater availability of better foreign jobs and advancement opportunities, the ability to obtain cheaper housing, and mostly to live in a much less crowded country with less crime, less traffic congestion, and better weather were listed prime factors….but not taxation. Less “work stress” and a greater value on “leisure and lifestyle” were the top reasons for emigration in a similar Alliance & Leicester study.

While high taxation may be a factor, it is certainly secondary. (The angry comments to the original linked article detailed many reasons from both the Left and Right for leaving, but taxation while mentioned, was not a leading reason.) Indeed, some destination countries have similar tax rates.

Britain’s post-Thatcher deregulated US-style economy, despite its growing GDP, is obviously not satisfying the middle and professional class in terms of ample opportunities, happiness, or quality of life. (We in the US are just beginning to see some of the same warning flags.) And Britain is undergoing a sea change, demographically that will lead to many more future changes and problems.

We would do well here in the US to look beyond taxation as the cause for Britain’s’ “brain loss” so we do not have a similar national malaise here in our future.